| 13-year-old kidnapped
in Abuja, rescued in Maiduguri
By ISMAIL OMIPIDAN, Maiduguri
Monday, August 2, 2004
|
• Moammadu
Sale
Photo: Sun News Publishing |
| |
If not for sheer providence, Mohammadu Sale, 13 would have
been sent to an untimely death.
Sale, was said to have been kidnapped in Abuja, the Federal
Capital Territory, on Saturday, July 3, 2004, only for him
to be accompanied by some good Samaritans in Maiduguri, the
Borno State capital, to the premises of the Nigeria Television
Authority (NTA), on Tuesday night, July 6, 2004.
The people numbering three had told the Assistant Manager,
News, of the NTA, Mallam Idris Issa in the presence of this
writer, that the boy just ran to them, and after narrating
his ordeal, they decided to bring him to the NTA.
Speaking to Daily Sun afterwards, Mohammadu Sale, said it
all started on Saturday, July 3, 2004, around 4.pm. He said
he had gone to the National Mosque Abuja, to witness a Quranic
competition. He was about entering the premises when someone
called him.
He heeded the call. Unknown to him however, someone was already
behind him. And the one behind “pushed me into the car,
and covered my mouth with his hands.
“Thereafter, he used his hand to rub my face, and I
slept off. I did not know anything again until we got to a
town where they changed their vehicle.
They used a jeep from Abuja. And they changed with another
Jeep.
“After spending two days there someone, a man just came
up to me. He opened my eyes, like a doctor examining a sick
patient, asked me to bring out my tongue, which I did. After
all that, he said they should go and drop me.
“The people were looking sad. And they asked me to enter
the motor again. And we started moving. We got to a big bush,
and when they wanted to drop me, one of them said no, they
should wait till night before they drop me.
“All this while, I did not even know that we were in
Maiduguri. As soon as I was dropped, I started running. Then
I entered where Muslims were praying. I narrated my story
to them and showed them my school I.D card. That was how they
brought me here (NTA).”
Incidentally, the Maiduguri NTA Zonal Network Centre was to
link the network service the night Mohammadu Sale, a primary
two pupil of Prince International School, Jiwa Town, Wuse,
Abuja, was taken there. The zonal manager of the center, Alhaji
Mohammed Al-Amin, wasted no time in directing that the boy’s
story be aired that same night, for the benefit of viewers
outside Borno state.
And by Thursday, July 8 2004, Alhaji Al-Amin had arranged
for the boy to be flown into Abuja, since he (Sale) said,
he knows the road to their house from Wuse market. He was
accompanied to Abuja, by the transport supervisor of NTA,
Maiduguri, Mallam Ali Mohammed.
Before leaving for Abuja, the little boy, who disclosed that
his mother was dead and father, a retired lawyer had some
words for little children like him.
“If you are called by any strange fellow, and he gives
you anything, don’t collect it from him”.
While commending both those who brought him to NTA premises
and the NTA management for their kind gesture, Sale said it
was God that saved him from being sacrificed for rituals.
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